A historic region in the eastern part of the Tatra Mountains and the Tatra foothills, Spisz was for centuries politically connected with Hungary. Between the 15th and the mid-18th century, Poland was in possession of what was called the Spisz starostwo [state domain]. It embraced thirteen towns in Spisz, plus the region of Lubowla-Podoliniec with the adjacent villages, all of which Sigismund of Luxembourg King of Hungary conveyed in 1412 to the Polish King Władysław Jagiełło as a pledge on the latter’s loan of 111 000 score of Prague Groschen.
Situated in the north west of Zamagurze Spiskie [Slovak: Zamagurie or Spišska Magura], Polish Spisz was incorporated into the Polish State in 1920, following a resolution of the Council of Ambassadors of the allied states in Paris. Polish settlement in this border area was an important factor in favour of the decision. Granted Poland after World War I, the north-western part of Spisz embraces the villages of Czarna Góra, Dursztyn, Falsztyn, Frydman, Jurgów, Kacwin, Krempachy, Łapsze Niżne, Łapsze Wyżnie, Łapszanka, Niedzica, Nowa Biała, Rzepiska and Trybsz. The rest of Spisz is Slovak.
Czarna Góra, one of fourteen villages in Polish Spisz, dates back to the late 16th/early 17th century.
In the northern part of Czarna Góra, in an estate called ‘Zagóra’, there is a wooden croft owned in the past by the affluent local Korkosz family. The layout of the buildings reflects the development of the Spisz croft from a simple bipartite one (consisting of a cottage and a stable) at the end of the 19th century, to a multipartite one in the 1930s. Alojzy Chyżny erected the first buildings late in the 19th century, then staying in America for several years. On his return to the village in 1919, he expanded the cottage, adding a sumptuous ‘big chamber’ with a komora (larder). Husband of Alojzy Chyżny’s daughter Elżbieta, Sebastian Korkosz was the next to expand the croft. Further farm buildings added in the 1930s were a stone stable, a cart-shed and a pigsty. The first treadmill in the village was installed in the old stable. The 1940s witnessed the last stage of expansion with the ‘summer’ or guest chamber with a separate entrance through the porch added.